Request: Complete Performances for Tutorials
While I appreciate the in-depth analysis provided in many Tonebase tutorials, I'm often left wanting more. Specifically, I'm missing the opportunity to hear a full performance of the piece being demonstrated. Analyzing fragments is helpful, but without hearing the complete work performed, it's more difficult to grasp the overall structure and how the individual parts contribute to the whole.
I hope the platform to consider this addition for future and existing tutorials!
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Good point.
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I think that I have the reverse problem that you do, Eric. There seems to be plenty of complete performances for each piece. I often go to YouTube if I want to hear some complete performances. Then Tonebase for the in-depth analysis.
That being said, I wish there were more tutorials on Tonebase. I have only been a member since last last November (2024). What I have noticed (and I may be mistaken) is that there was a rush of tutorials that were produced during the COVID years, often involving major guitar celebrities who probably had very few live performances during that time. You can all feel free to correct me if I am mistaken. But since ... let's say 2022 ... the number of new tutorials being produced has subsided.
I have been dying for a good tutorial on Morel's Danza Brasilera. When I do a search on "Morel", it seems that there is something coming one of these days, but no word on when.
So, I have had to do a bit of hacking on homegrown tutorials by capturing various YouTube videos, importing them into Quicktime, isolating measures, and then playing those snippets back with VLC at a slower tempo. (Yes, I know that YouTube allows you to slow down a video, but I want handy measure-by-measure clips that I can easily access.)-marc
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Marc Adler Hi Marc - I joined ToneBase in 2020, just as the Covid lockdowns were getting started. A lot of the pre-recorded material was already available at that time. What was produced over the following years was a series of excellent live-streams, broadcast at a rate of two or three a week. (These have been archived, and if you look through them, you'll see just how much excellent material was presented in those years.) Unfortunately, this steady flow seems to have come to an end. We do still have live-streams, but rather few are aimed specifically at the guitar community. (Only two or three so far in 2025.) Part of the current lull in activity may be attributable to the temporary absence of Martin Zinny, who has become the main presenter of guitar materials for the platform. But I suspect the larger reason has to do with the broader aims of ToneBase management. It seems to me that the focus at the moment is on developing new revenue streams.
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David Krupka Yes, the past livestreams were numerous and excellent. I wish that they still came out at the same pace as they did a few years ago. It is certainly a different time now than it was 5 years ago. 5 years ago, we were all united in a common cause, one for all and all for one. Now, I find myself apologizing to my Canadian friends.
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Marc Adler I agree that overall the ratio of complete performances vs in-depth analysis available is very high and you always can find lots of complete performances on e.g YouTube.
If you are a top professional performer providing analysis and teaching of a piece you may be reluctant to present a quick shoot performance that might be compared to other performances edited from multiple shoots ,, I would!
At a time point multiple lessons disappeared including Danza Brasilieira , taught by Celia Raya.
‘There is no way to access that lesson.. except if it is in your incompleted lesson library.. So I can access that lesson. I wrote twice to Tonebase technical support and listed several disappeared lessons, but seemingly was not taken very seriously -
Lars Kjøller-Hansen, Thanks for that info regarding the disappearing lessons. That is a bit concerning to me. I have no idea about the various licensing arrangements that Tonebase has with the artists. It could very well be that the agreements are simply limited by time, or it could be something more concerning. I do not know if the artists are compensated on a commission basis and only get paid when someone has completed the course.
Celia Raya is a teacher who is local to me and sometimes comes to the meetings at the NYC Guitar Society. The next time I see him, I will ask him if there is any way that I can access his tutorial on Danza Brasilera.
Two things about your response concern me a bit. First, why didn't Tonebase's management take your inquiry seriously? Second and even more concerning, which tutorials have a chance of "disappearing" in the near future? It would be good for Tonebase to pre-announce which tutorials are going "off the air" in the near future, much like streaming networks tell you which movies are going off the air.
-marc -
Marc Adler I Think that disappearing lessons primarily are due to some “programming”issue -missing and disappearing links during interface upgrades. I don’t think in that any lessons are temporary. I am very very content with tonebase and would recommend it to any serious music enthusiast. My only disappointment has been when I had to write two times before a small and incomplete response on missing lessons appeared. A few reappeared but some did not
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Lars Kjøller-Hansen, I think I will write to Customer Support here and see if I can get to those missing Morel lessons. I know that Ashley is busy preparing for he doctoral recital, but hopefully, she can squeeze in a bit of time to respond.
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Thanks Eric. I totally second your suggestion.
The tutorials are great, but I always find it frustrating and incomplete not having a full, uninterrupted performance of the piece by the artist rendering the instructions to see how his or her technical/musical vision informs the totality of the work. Kind of seems like simple common sense to me.
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I also support this suggestion. Especially for the instructor to complete the tutorial with his/her performance as taught in the said tutorial. This completes teh tutorial and sets a goal of how this should be when we master the piece. Youtube and that performance may not have the same impact for an early intermediate learner like me IMHO. Hope we set this up and also publish all scores with the teachers' annotations. Not all classes have the same (e.g. Sabrina's class on Bouree BMV 996) has score inlaid with her suggestions but not published as a score for download and practice. martin - for your kind consideration. Warm regards, Sri
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Yes, not having a complete performance is a big drawback. Like most of Tonebase I feel it is very disjointed and unstructured.
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